Equus Equus by Peter Shaffer Setting: Rokeby Psychiatric Hospital, present time
Characters:
Alan Strang- Protagonist of the novel, teenage boy who is arrested after blinding 6 horses at Dalton's stables, where he works- practices pagan rituals to his god, Equus
Martin Dysart- Psychiatrist who has doubts about the worth of his profession and existence. He believes he can make Alan "normal," but doesn't want him to lose his creativity and passion
Frank Strang- Alan's father, atheist, "old type Socialist." He holds his wife responsible for Alan's psychological condition
Jill Mason- Introduced Alan to Dalton and helped him get a job at the stable- she is very sexually attracted to Alan
Hesther Saloman- A friend of Dysart, who persuades him to help Alan- she encourages him to make Alan "normal"
Dora Strang- Alan's mother, a former school teacher. She is very religious and tries to teach Alan about the Bible, against her husband's wishes- feels she married beneath her
Harry Dalton- Stable owner, feels that Alan should be in prison for what he did
Horseman- Provides Alan with his first experience riding a horse, and gets yelled at by Alan's parents for doing so
Nugget- A horse that Alan is fixated on erotically- he takes him out for midnight rides naked Dysart is persuaded to see Alan, who has blinded six horses. Alan is very evasive and sings jingles when he is asked questions. After a few sessions, Alan starts opening up, and then Dysart goes to see Alan's parents. Dora tells him that Alan has always been interested in horses, and tells how Alan has memorized a passage in the bible about horses. Frank says, "religion is like bad sex."Alan tells about his first experience riding a horse, and the man let him go as fast as he wanted. Dysart later finds out that there was a graphic poster of Christ that used to hang above Alan's bed- Frank god mad one night and tore it down, it was then replaced with a photo of a horse. Frank tells Dysart he saw Alan beating himself with a coat hanger, kneeling reverently in front of the poster. He then learns about Jill. Dora comes to visit, and gets in an argument with Alan, who slaps him then. Dysart gives Alan a placebo and Alan tells him about the night Jill and he went to see a pornographic movie, and saw his father there. Then, they tried to have a sexual encounter, but Alan couldn't because he "heard" Equus' disapproval. Then he proceeded to blind the horses.
Symbols, Devices, Themes:
-Sex-Alan is sexually aroused by horses, and makes his religious practice into a sort of sexual act
-God and Religion- Alan's Christ poster is replaced with a horse picture, which Alan begins worshipping.
-Reverse Psychology- Dysart uses reverse psychology on Alan many times. He gives him a placebo and calls it a "truth pill." He also tells Alan to leave during a session, and this in turn makes Alan open up and tell Dysart what happened
-Childhood contradictions- His parents taught him different things. While his mother tries to teach him about religion and God, Frank would say that religion is like "bad sex"
-Sanity vs. Insanity- people believe Alan is insane, but as Dysart uncovers the truth, he doesn't really believe that Alan is insane- he thinks he is just a very passionate young man
Sarah Bugay
AP English
Ms. Corlies
November 29, 2009 Friday Flashback: the Catcher in the Rye
Author and Title: J. D. Salinger, the Catcher in the Rye
Setting: Pencey Prep (Boarding School in Pennsylvania) and New York, 1950
Main Characters:
Holden Caulfield- A seventeen year old boy that is consistently expelled from boarding schools within half of the year he is there and hates “phonies.”
D.B. Caulfield (only brought up)- Holden’s author older brother that is currently writing movie scripts in Hollywood.
Phoebe Caulfield- Holden’s little sister and the person Holden is most fond of. She and Holden are extremely close and she acts old for her age.
Allie Caulfield (only brought up)- Holden’s younger brother that died when Holden was thirteen. Allie was extremely smart and wrote poems on his baseball glove.
Ward Stradlater- Holden’s roommate at Pencey Prep that experiences narcissism everyday of his life. “Secret slob.”
Robert Ackley- Student at Pencey Prep that Holden hangs out with though more than half the time he does not want to. “Ackley kid” is dirty looking and thinks everyone is a “bastard.”
Jane Gallagher (only brought up)- Childhood friend of Holden’s that he is most conflicted about. While he wishes to call her there is always an excuse not to, he thinks about her throughout the entire novel.
Mr. Spencer- Holden’s social studies teacher at Pencey Prep that Holden becomes close with. Mr. Spencer tries to lecture Holden about his future.
Mr. Antolini- Holden’s old English teacher at Elkton Hills (another boarding school of Holden’s) that has remained close with Holden’s family over the years and tries to warn Holden about a “fall” he is bound to endure in the future.
Holden Caulfield is expelled from yet another boarding school for flunking out of every subject except for English. Holden hates Pencey Prep because he believes it is filled with a bunch of “phonies,” as he believes his past boarding schools to be filled with as well. Holden’s roommate Stradlater takes out Holden’s childhood friend, Jane Gallagher, which sets Holden up to be thinking about her throughout the rest of the novel. Stradlater and Ackley are the only people Holden really likes, at least some of the time, at Pencey Prep. Though Holden is expelled and required to return home Wednesday he leaves Sunday night because he cannot bear Pencey Prep another second. He stops by Mr. Spencer’s house and grabs a train. He books a really cheap hotel room and after he drops his bags off he goes into the lobby and dances with these women that are much older than him. After everyone leaves, Holden goes to Ernie’s, a piano playing “hot-shot” that only talks to celebrities because he is a “phony.” He leaves Ernie’s early though when he bumps into old acquaintances of D. B’s and does not want to be around them. When he goes back to the hotel he gets a prostitute from the elevator boy, Maurice. Holden only wanted to talk to Sunny, the prostitute, after he thought about it and she left. Maurice comes back to collect five more dollars that he says Holden owes when Holden paid her the correct amount. Maurice punches Holden. The next day Holden checks out and eats breakfast at Grand Central station where he meets these two nuns and gives them money for the Salvation Army. He then goes on a date with a girl he used to go out with, Sally Hayes, and takes her to the movies and ice skating. He likes her because of her good looks and asks her to marry him in a state of mania. They get into a fight and he goes to the movies alone. He then met up with his old acquaintance from Whooton (another past boarding school), Carl Luce, and goes out to drinks with him. Holden then goes to see Phoebe and talks with her about her life and his current predicament. Holden goes to stay with Mr. Antolini but leaves suddenly in the night when he wakes up to find Mr. Antolini petting his head. Holden sleeps at Grand Central Station and gets nauseous. He decides he is going to say goodbye to Phoebe and leave New York to go hitch-hiking out West and build a cabin for himself where he will pretend to be a deaf-mute so he will not have to hear all the “phonies.” He tells Phoebe to meet him at the museum to tell her, but when she arrives with bags to go along with him he yells at her and in return she becomes angry with him. Apologetically he assures her he will not be leaving, allows her to skip the second half of school, and takes her to the zoo and the carousal. It is then, that he truly intends to go home and stay home.
Literary Devices/Motifs:
Flashback
i.The entire novel is a tale Holden is telling the reader about. He consistently refers to the reader as “you” and only acknowledges the present in the end of the novel.
Motif
i.Allie’s catcher’s mitt makes a consistent appearance throughout the novel with specific mention to the poems that Allie wrote all over it. It represents Holden’s constant source of sorrow and regret. Allie is everything he wishes he could be and one of only two people he believes not to be a phony. Whenever Holden is feeling low he makes reference to the catcher’s mitt.
Themes:
Hypocrisy
i.It is hypocritical that Holden drills it into the novel his hatred of phonies but is in fact one. He hangs out with people he does not like (i.e. Sally Hayes, Stradlater, and Ackley) and thinks that people that go to see movies are phonies, but takes Sally to a movie on their date and in his spare time goes to one himself.
Symbolism
i.Catcher in the rye: Holden wishes he could have the job of catcher in the rye to stop people from falling off cliffs when in reality he is told by Mr. Antolini, Mr. Spencer, and others that he is going down a spiral path. Mr. Antolini says he is “doomed for a fall.” ii.The Red Hunting Cap: Easily identifiable in the masses, represents Holden’s individuality and the way he sees himself. Holden believes he is separate from the “phonies” of the world.
Irony
i.It is ironic that while Holden thinks about committing many violent acts, (such as his fantasies about what he would do to Maurice and whoever wrote the obscenities on the wall of the museum) he won’t because as he admits he is too “yellow” to do anything about it.
Honesty
i.Throughout the entire novel Holden is completely truthful with the reader about his personality. He claims the title of “most terrific liar” and embraces that he is “yellow” throughout the novel.
Depression
i.Holden is constantly depressed throughout the novel. So many things he sees or thinks about ends with him saying “that depresses the hell out of me.” ii.Holden’s reaction to his brother, Allie’s, death of trying to punch all of the windows out of the station wagon.
Critical Essay
Like so many heroes of contemporary fiction—Morris' Boyd, Ellison's Invisible Man, Malamud's Frank, Salinger's Seymour—Holden is an impotent savior. Because he can neither save his evil world nor live in it as it is, he retreats into fantasy—into childhood. He decides to become a deaf-mute, to live alone in an isolated cabin, to commit a kind of symbolic suicide. It is an unrealizable fantasy, but a death wish nevertheless. However, Holden's social conscience forces him out of spiritual retirement. When he discovers an obscenity scrawled on one of the walls of Phoebe's school, he rubs it out with his hand to protect the innocence of the children. For the moment he is a successful catcher in the rye. But then he discovers another such notice, "scratched on, with a knife or something," and then another. He realizes that he cannot possibly erase all the scribbled obscenities in the world, that he cannot catch all the children, that evil is ineradicable. This is the final disillusionment. Dizzy with his terrible awareness, Holden insults Phoebe when she insists on running away with him. In his vision of despair, he sees Phoebe's irrevocable doom as well as his own, and for a moment he hates her as he hates himself—as he hates the world. Once he has hurt her, however, he realizes the commitment that his love for her imposes on him; if he is to assuage her pain, he must continue to live in the world. When she kisses him as a token of forgiveness and love and, as if in consequence, it begins to rain, Holden, bathed by the rain, is purified—in a sense, redeemed. A too literal reading of Holden's divulgence that he is telling the story from some kind of rest home has led to a misinterpretation of the end of the novel. Holden is always less insane than his world. The last scene, in which Holden, suffused with happiness, sits in the rain and watches Phoebe ride on the merry-go-round, is indicative not of his crack-up, as has been assumed, but of his redemption. Whereas all the adults in his world have failed him (and he, a butter-fingered catcher in the rye, has failed them), a ten-year-old girl saves him—becomes his catcher. Love is the redemptive grace. Phoebe replaces Jane, the loss of whom had initiated Holden's despair, flight, and quest for experience as salvation. Holden's pure communion with Phoebe may be construed as a reversion to childlike innocence, but this is the only way to redemption in Salinger's world—there is no other good. Innocence is all. Love is innocence. The last scene, with Holden drenched in Scott Fitzgerald's all-absolving rain, seems unashamedly sentimental. Certainly Salinger overstates the spiritually curative powers of children; innocence can be destructive as well as redemptive. Yet Salinger's view of the universe, in which all adults (even the most apparently decent) are corrupt and consequently destructive, is bleak and somewhat terrifying. Since growing up in the real world is tragic, in Salinger's ideal world time must be stopped to prevent the loss of childhood, to salvage the remnants of innocence. At one point in the novel, Holden wishes that life were as changeless and pure as the exhibitions under glass cases in the Museum of Natural History. This explains, in part, Holden's ecstasy in the rain at the close of the novel. In watching Phoebe go round and round on the carrousel, in effect going nowhere, he sees her in the timeless continuum of art on the verge of changing, yet unchanging, forever safe, forever loving, forever innocent.
Like so many heroes of contemporary fiction—Morris' Boyd, Ellison's Invisible Man, Malamud's Frank, Salinger's Seymour—Holden is an impotent savior. Because he can neither save his evil world nor live in it as it is, he retreats into fantasy—into childhood. He decides to become a deaf-mute, to live alone in an isolated cabin, to commit a kind of symbolic suicide. It is an unrealizable fantasy, but a death wish nevertheless. However, Holden's social conscience forces him out of spiritual retirement. When he discovers an obscenity scrawled on one of the walls of Phoebe's school, he rubs it out with his hand to protect the innocence of the children. For the moment he is a successful catcherin the rye. But then he discovers another such notice, "scratched on, with a knife or something," and then another. He realizes that he cannot possibly erase all the scribbled obscenities in the world, that he cannot catch all the children, that evil is ineradicable.
1 AP Corlies
Equus
Equus by Peter Shaffer
Setting: Rokeby Psychiatric Hospital, present time
Characters:
Alan Strang- Protagonist of the novel, teenage boy who is arrested after blinding 6 horses at Dalton's stables, where he works- practices pagan rituals to his god, Equus
Martin Dysart- Psychiatrist who has doubts about the worth of his profession and existence. He believes he can make Alan "normal," but doesn't want him to lose his creativity and passion
Frank Strang- Alan's father, atheist, "old type Socialist." He holds his wife responsible for Alan's psychological condition
Jill Mason- Introduced Alan to Dalton and helped him get a job at the stable- she is very sexually attracted to Alan
Hesther Saloman- A friend of Dysart, who persuades him to help Alan- she encourages him to make Alan "normal"
Dora Strang- Alan's mother, a former school teacher. She is very religious and tries to teach Alan about the Bible, against her husband's wishes- feels she married beneath her
Harry Dalton- Stable owner, feels that Alan should be in prison for what he did
Horseman- Provides Alan with his first experience riding a horse, and gets yelled at by Alan's parents for doing so
Nugget- A horse that Alan is fixated on erotically- he takes him out for midnight rides naked
Dysart is persuaded to see Alan, who has blinded six horses. Alan is very evasive and sings jingles when he is asked questions. After a few sessions, Alan starts opening up, and then Dysart goes to see Alan's parents. Dora tells him that Alan has always been interested in horses, and tells how Alan has memorized a passage in the bible about horses. Frank says, "religion is like bad sex."Alan tells about his first experience riding a horse, and the man let him go as fast as he wanted.
Dysart later finds out that there was a graphic poster of Christ that used to hang above Alan's bed- Frank god mad one night and tore it down, it was then replaced with a photo of a horse. Frank tells Dysart he saw Alan beating himself with a coat hanger, kneeling reverently in front of the poster. He then learns about Jill. Dora comes to visit, and gets in an argument with Alan, who slaps him then. Dysart gives Alan a placebo and Alan tells him about the night Jill and he went to see a pornographic movie, and saw his father there. Then, they tried to have a sexual encounter, but Alan couldn't because he "heard" Equus' disapproval. Then he proceeded to blind the horses.
Symbols, Devices, Themes:
-Sex-Alan is sexually aroused by horses, and makes his religious practice into a sort of sexual act
-God and Religion- Alan's Christ poster is replaced with a horse picture, which Alan begins worshipping.
-Reverse Psychology- Dysart uses reverse psychology on Alan many times. He gives him a placebo and calls it a "truth pill." He also tells Alan to leave during a session, and this in turn makes Alan open up and tell Dysart what happened
-Childhood contradictions- His parents taught him different things. While his mother tries to teach him about religion and God, Frank would say that religion is like "bad sex"
-Sanity vs. Insanity- people believe Alan is insane, but as Dysart uncovers the truth, he doesn't really believe that Alan is insane- he thinks he is just a very passionate young man
Sarah Bugay
AP English
Ms. Corlies
November 29, 2009
Friday Flashback: the Catcher in the Rye
- Author and Title: J. D. Salinger, the Catcher in the Rye
- Setting: Pencey Prep (Boarding School in Pennsylvania) and New York, 1950
- Main Characters:
- Holden Caulfield- A seventeen year old boy that is consistently expelled from boarding schools within half of the year he is there and hates “phonies.”
- D.B. Caulfield (only brought up)- Holden’s author older brother that is currently writing movie scripts in Hollywood.
- Phoebe Caulfield- Holden’s little sister and the person Holden is most fond of. She and Holden are extremely close and she acts old for her age.
- Allie Caulfield (only brought up)- Holden’s younger brother that died when Holden was thirteen. Allie was extremely smart and wrote poems on his baseball glove.
- Ward Stradlater- Holden’s roommate at Pencey Prep that experiences narcissism everyday of his life. “Secret slob.”
- Robert Ackley- Student at Pencey Prep that Holden hangs out with though more than half the time he does not want to. “Ackley kid” is dirty looking and thinks everyone is a “bastard.”
- Jane Gallagher (only brought up)- Childhood friend of Holden’s that he is most conflicted about. While he wishes to call her there is always an excuse not to, he thinks about her throughout the entire novel.
- Mr. Spencer- Holden’s social studies teacher at Pencey Prep that Holden becomes close with. Mr. Spencer tries to lecture Holden about his future.
- Mr. Antolini- Holden’s old English teacher at Elkton Hills (another boarding school of Holden’s) that has remained close with Holden’s family over the years and tries to warn Holden about a “fall” he is bound to endure in the future.
- Holden Caulfield is expelled from yet another boarding school for flunking out of every subject except for English. Holden hates Pencey Prep because he believes it is filled with a bunch of “phonies,” as he believes his past boarding schools to be filled with as well. Holden’s roommate Stradlater takes out Holden’s childhood friend, Jane Gallagher, which sets Holden up to be thinking about her throughout the rest of the novel. Stradlater and Ackley are the only people Holden really likes, at least some of the time, at Pencey Prep. Though Holden is expelled and required to return home Wednesday he leaves Sunday night because he cannot bear Pencey Prep another second. He stops by Mr. Spencer’s house and grabs a train. He books a really cheap hotel room and after he drops his bags off he goes into the lobby and dances with these women that are much older than him. After everyone leaves, Holden goes to Ernie’s, a piano playing “hot-shot” that only talks to celebrities because he is a “phony.” He leaves Ernie’s early though when he bumps into old acquaintances of D. B’s and does not want to be around them. When he goes back to the hotel he gets a prostitute from the elevator boy, Maurice. Holden only wanted to talk to Sunny, the prostitute, after he thought about it and she left. Maurice comes back to collect five more dollars that he says Holden owes when Holden paid her the correct amount. Maurice punches Holden. The next day Holden checks out and eats breakfast at Grand Central station where he meets these two nuns and gives them money for the Salvation Army. He then goes on a date with a girl he used to go out with, Sally Hayes, and takes her to the movies and ice skating. He likes her because of her good looks and asks her to marry him in a state of mania. They get into a fight and he goes to the movies alone. He then met up with his old acquaintance from Whooton (another past boarding school), Carl Luce, and goes out to drinks with him. Holden then goes to see Phoebe and talks with her about her life and his current predicament. Holden goes to stay with Mr. Antolini but leaves suddenly in the night when he wakes up to find Mr. Antolini petting his head. Holden sleeps at Grand Central Station and gets nauseous. He decides he is going to say goodbye to Phoebe and leave New York to go hitch-hiking out West and build a cabin for himself where he will pretend to be a deaf-mute so he will not have to hear all the “phonies.” He tells Phoebe to meet him at the museum to tell her, but when she arrives with bags to go along with him he yells at her and in return she becomes angry with him. Apologetically he assures her he will not be leaving, allows her to skip the second half of school, and takes her to the zoo and the carousal. It is then, that he truly intends to go home and stay home.
- Literary Devices/Motifs:
- Flashback
i. The entire novel is a tale Holden is telling the reader about. He consistently refers to the reader as “you” and only acknowledges the present in the end of the novel.- Motif
i. Allie’s catcher’s mitt makes a consistent appearance throughout the novel with specific mention to the poems that Allie wrote all over it. It represents Holden’s constant source of sorrow and regret. Allie is everything he wishes he could be and one of only two people he believes not to be a phony. Whenever Holden is feeling low he makes reference to the catcher’s mitt.- Themes:
- Hypocrisy
i. It is hypocritical that Holden drills it into the novel his hatred of phonies but is in fact one. He hangs out with people he does not like (i.e. Sally Hayes, Stradlater, and Ackley) and thinks that people that go to see movies are phonies, but takes Sally to a movie on their date and in his spare time goes to one himself.- Symbolism
i. Catcher in the rye: Holden wishes he could have the job of catcher in the rye to stop people from falling off cliffs when in reality he is told by Mr. Antolini, Mr. Spencer, and others that he is going down a spiral path. Mr. Antolini says he is “doomed for a fall.”ii. The Red Hunting Cap: Easily identifiable in the masses, represents Holden’s individuality and the way he sees himself. Holden believes he is separate from the “phonies” of the world.
- Irony
i. It is ironic that while Holden thinks about committing many violent acts, (such as his fantasies about what he would do to Maurice and whoever wrote the obscenities on the wall of the museum) he won’t because as he admits he is too “yellow” to do anything about it.- Honesty
i. Throughout the entire novel Holden is completely truthful with the reader about his personality. He claims the title of “most terrific liar” and embraces that he is “yellow” throughout the novel.- Depression
i. Holden is constantly depressed throughout the novel. So many things he sees or thinks about ends with him saying “that depresses the hell out of me.”ii. Holden’s reaction to his brother, Allie’s, death of trying to punch all of the windows out of the station wagon.
- Critical Essay
-
Like so many heroes of contemporary fiction—Morris' Boyd, Ellison's Invisible Man, Malamud's Frank, Salinger's Seymour—Holden is an impotent savior. Because he can neither save his evil world nor live in it as it is, he retreats into fantasy—into childhood. He decides to become a deaf-mute, to live alone in an isolated cabin, to commit a kind of symbolic suicide. It is an unrealizable fantasy, but a death wish nevertheless. However, Holden's social conscience forces him out of spiritual retirement. When he discovers an obscenity scrawled on one of the walls of Phoebe's school, he rubs it out with his hand to protect the innocence of the children. For the moment he is a successful catcher in the rye. But then he discovers another such notice, "scratched on, with a knife or something," and then another. He realizes that he cannot possibly erase all the scribbled obscenities in the world, that he cannot catch all the children, that evil is ineradicable. This is the final disillusionment. Dizzy with his terrible awareness, Holden insults Phoebe when she insists on running away with him. In his vision of despair, he sees Phoebe's irrevocable doom as well as his own, and for a moment he hates her as he hates himself—as he hates the world. Once he has hurt her, however, he realizes the commitment that his love for her imposes on him; if he is to assuage her pain, he must continue to live in the world. When she kisses him as a token of forgiveness and love and, as if in consequence, it begins to rain, Holden, bathed by the rain, is purified—in a sense, redeemed. A too literal reading of Holden's divulgence that he is telling the story from some kind of rest home has led to a misinterpretation of the end of the novel. Holden is always less insane than his world. The last scene, in which Holden, suffused with happiness, sits in the rain and watches Phoebe ride on the merry-go-round, is indicative not of his crack-up, as has been assumed, but of his redemption. Whereas all the adults in his world have failed him (and he, a butter-fingered catcher in the rye, has failed them), a ten-year-old girl saves him—becomes his catcher. Love is the redemptive grace. Phoebe replaces Jane, the loss of whom had initiated Holden's despair, flight, and quest for experience as salvation. Holden's pure communion with Phoebe may be construed as a reversion to childlike innocence, but this is the only way to redemption in Salinger's world—there is no other good. Innocence is all. Love is innocence. The last scene, with Holden drenched in Scott Fitzgerald's all-absolving rain, seems unashamedly sentimental. Certainly Salinger overstates the spiritually curative powers of children; innocence can be destructive as well as redemptive. Yet Salinger's view of the universe, in which all adults (even the most apparently decent) are corrupt and consequently destructive, is bleak and somewhat terrifying. Since growing up in the real world is tragic, in Salinger's ideal world time must be stopped to prevent the loss of childhood, to salvage the remnants of innocence. At one point in the novel, Holden wishes that life were as changeless and pure as the exhibitions under glass cases in the Museum of Natural History. This explains, in part, Holden's ecstasy in the rain at the close of the novel. In watching Phoebe go round and round on the carrousel, in effect going nowhere, he sees her in the timeless continuum of art on the verge of changing, yet unchanging, forever safe, forever loving, forever innocent.